Craig Spencer, a New York
City doctor, tested positive for Ebola on October 23. The story broke online
the same day, and by the next morning, tabloids were plastered with images of
masked and gowned health workers with headlines such as Bungle Fever and Ebola!
Late-night comedy, Twitter, local news: the story was inescapable, the hysteria
palpable. All in all, only eleven Ebola patients were treated on U.S. soil. But
the media’s reaction affected the lives of anyone who watched television or had
an internet connection.

The Ebola epidemic in Africa
has died down. Liberia is Ebola-free, while Sierra Leone and Guinea continue to
report cases in the low single digits per week. Most promisingly, a new vaccine
has been shown to be highly effective in a clinical trial. Given the vaccine,
it seems that the likelihood of future epidemics on the scale of the one in
2014 is low. But especially during the early days of the epidemic,
miscommunication and mistrust of international public health workers slowed the
medical response and exacerbated the epidemic. And, as the reaction to the New
York City case shows us, this problem is not unique to West African countries.

Even if the threat from
Ebola in particular is under control, infectious disease is endemic to
civilization. Knowing that new epidemic threats can emerge at any time, important questions need to be considered.

How prepared are Philadelphia’s institutions to communicate with
the public in the event of a future epidemic? What specific challenges were
successfully or unsuccessfully addressed during the Ebola crisis that could
provide learning points going forward? Are there successful models or case
studies for handling communication during epidemics that are worth emulating?

These questions will be up
for debate on Wednesday at the University of Pennsylvania in a forum open to
the public. The event will be held in the Penn bookstore (3601 Walnut St.)
upstairs meeting room from 5:30 to 7 p.m. on Wednesday, November 4.

The event is hosted by two
graduate student groups at Penn, the Emerging Leaders in Science and Society
(ELISS) Fellows and the Penn Science Policy Group
with the goal of fostering collaborative ideas to develop effective
channels to manage trust, fear, and accurate communication during potential
future epidemics.

On the panel for the forum
will be three innovators in communicating public health issues, Dr. Mitesh Patel,
MD, MBA, MS, James Garrow, MPH, and Dr. Giang T. Nguyen, MD, MPH, MSCE. Moderating the discussion will be Dr. Max
King, Ph.D., Associate Vice Provost for Health and Academic Services at Penn.

Community members are
encouraged to attend the forum with questions and comments. People can also
watch a live stream of the event (check our twitter page for the link) and
submit questions via twitter with #EpidemicPhilly.

Biographies of the
panelists and moderator

Mitesh Patel

Mitesh
S. Patel, MD, MBA, MS is a board-certified general internist, physician
scientist, and entrepreneur. He is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and
Health Care Management at the Perelman School of Medicine and The Wharton
School at the University of Pennsylvania. His work focuses on leveraging
behavioral economics, connected health approaches and data science to improve
population health and increase value within the health care delivery
system.

As a physician-scientist, Mitesh studies how we
can utilize innovative technology and connected health approaches to passively
monitor activity and how we can use health incentives to motivate behavior
change. His prior work has been published in NEJM, JAMA, the Annals of Internal
Medicine and featured in the New York Times, NPR, and CNN. Mitesh
also co-founded, Docphin, a startup that strives
to improve the application of evidence-based medicine into clinical practice.

Mitesh holds undergraduate degrees in Economics
and Biochemistry as well as a Medical Doctorate from the University of
Michigan. He obtained an MBA in Health Care Management from The Wharton School
and an MS in Health Policy Research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the
University of Pennsylvania. Mitesh completed his internal medicine residency
training and the Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program at the
University of Pennsylvania.

James Garrow

James Garrow, MPH is a
nationally recognized proponent and advocate for the use of social media and digital
tools in the execution of public health activities. His role as the Director of
Digital Public Health in Philadelphia is among the first in the country charged
with using new digital tools and techniques like social media, crowdsourcing,
and big data utilization. He also provides media relations support for the
Philadelphia Department of Public Health.

An accomplished public speaker and noted thought leader, Jim has been invited
to and spoken at conferences across the US on social media use in public health
and emergency response. He is an active social media user, maintaining two
regularly scheduled Twitterchats and a blog on crisis and emergency risk
communications.

Jim
obtained a B.S. in Applied Sociology from Drexel in 2001 and a Master’s of Public
Health from Temple in 2011.

Giang T. Nguyen

Dr. Nguyen, MD, MPH, MSCE,
is an Assistant Professor in the School of Medicine, Department of Family
Medicine and Community Health at Penn. He is also Chair of the MD-MPH Advisory Committee
and a member of the MPH Program Curriculum Committee.

Dr. Nguyen leads the Penn
Asian Health Initiatives. His research focus is in Asian immigrant health with
concentrations in cancer control, disease prevention, and community-based
participatory research. His community engagement work has included outreach to
Vietnamese and other Southeast Asian refugees, health fairs and immunization
clinics, cancer education workshops, advocacy, HIV/AIDS, and LGBT issues. He
serves on boards and advisory committees for several Asian serving
organizations, including the Asian and Pacific Islander National Cancer
Survivors Network.

Dr. Nguyen is also the
Medical Director of Penn Family Care, the clinical practice of the University
of Pennsylvania's Department of Family Medicine and Community Health. He
provides direct care to adult and pediatric patients in the primary care
setting and teaches medical students and family medicine residents. He also is
a Senior Fellow of the Penn Center for Public Health Initiatives, where he is a
core faculty member for the Penn MPH program.

Max King

Previously the coordinator of Penn State's University Scholars
Program, Max King, Ph.D., MS, is now Associate Vice Provost for Health and
Academic Services at The University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. King holds three degrees from Penn State: a B.S. in Biological
Health, M.S. in Health Education, and Ph.D. from the Interdisciplinary Program
in Educational Theory and Policy. His research focus is the multidimensional
Methodology of Q-Analysis, or Polyhedral Dynamics, a higher-level structural
analysis approach derived from algebraic topology.Dr. King also held an appointment as an Affiliate Assistant
Professor and a member of the graduate faculty in the Department of
Administration, Policy, Foundations, and Comparative/International Education at
Penn State. He taught educational foundations, comparative education, British
education, research methods, and international education. He also has extensive
experience in computer systems, developing mainframe and microcomputer research
and thesis applications.

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